Bree slams Labour Leadership over disintegration of Leitrim LP

The Labour Party has been accused by one of its own local councillors of having no regard for the members of the party in the North Leitrim. Sligo councillor, Declan Bree, has issued a scathing statement against his party leadership, following the surprise decision by its North Leitrim representative to resign.

In yet more controversy for the Labour Party, Councillor Bree has accused the party leadership of sacrificing Gabriel McSharry and the entire North Leitriim membership, rather than adding him as second candidate on the party ticket to run in the Sligo-North constituency at the next election.

Mr McSharry has given no specific reason for his decision to resign; all the members of the party in North Leitrim, aside from one member, have also resigned. Councillor Bree says Mr McSharry's resignation is a devastating blow to the Labour Party, as he has been the standard bearer for the party for 15 years in North Leitrim.

Despite the fact, he adds, that the entire membership of the Labour Party in North Leitrim wanted him added as a party candidate to contest the next election, and that the Sligo-Leitrim constituency council had requested that his name be added to the ticket, the party leadership has consistently refused to include him as a candidate.

It would appear, he claims, that the Labour General Election campaign in Sligo-North Leitrim will be solely about sweeping up preference votes for Fine Gael. Cllr Bree says it seems as if Gabriel McSharry and the members of the party in North Leitrim mean nothing to the Labour Party leadership

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Comments (17 of 17)

It seems that Labour in Rural Ireland id being sold out for FG votes, Leitrim probably had the highest concentration of LP members than most areas in the west and this is a great shame. Labours chance of winning its first seat on Leitrim Co.Co. is gone with the departure of Gabriel McSharry.

when labour in dublin took in jimmy mc garry to get rid of bree they though bree and he's supporters would quit wentin a month. This did not happen, the real left in the party stay to get up mc garry nose. Dublin consider mc sharry to be hand in glove with bree so they abandon leitrim to FG. Any one with any left wing idea's had to go. This is the new labour

Expect Bree to announce he’s running as an Independent off the back of the 'outrageous treatment' of McSharry and Scanlon. Blah blah blah.
Bree has been searching for a reason to leave Labour 'under duress' since he failed to get booted out and has been constantly sniped at for his puerile bawdy attacks at the leadership whilst still a member of the party. He’s actually starting to look ridiculous.

Why didn’t Bree quit labour the minute they accepted a blueshirt in to the Ranks?
People aren’t putting enough thought in to that very damning question.
Bree is an opportunist, deluded into thinking he and he alone has the right to represent the left. That’s why I don’t like the arrogant pr*ck, he’s a control freak.
And as much as I hate McGarry, the reality is that come the election Bree will poll less than even that weasel.

Labour, didn't fall apart because of McGarry or even Rabbitte.

It’s been crumbling for nearly a decade with its disgraceful migration to the right and 'Comrade' Bree has done nothing to prevent it.

Declan Bree served as a TD for over 4 years. In that time he voted for Albert Reynolds and John Bruton for Taoiseach. That was his time to rebel against Labour's leadership. He should have established a seperate organisation THEN not now after his long list of 1992-97 sell-outs. Bree has no credibility. He could have been a source of left-opposition to FF-Labour & FG-Labour governments but he decided to support them. He could have been re-elected in '97 if he had the balls to stand-up in the 90s. By now he could have been a left TD alongside Higgins, Healy, Gregory, Daly, etc. But he never decided to stand-up and be counted when it mattered. Why? Fundementally he's a sell-out and an electoral opportunist not a principled left-winger.

So you admit it. Bree tailers his politics to the middle of the road. Say that to the people on waiting lists and in crappy schools (Labour supported by Bree were in these ministries in 1992-7 with no improvement). Anyway, I don't accept that people living in the west are naturally inclined to right-wing or clientist politics. How patronising of you to suggest that. An honest fighting left-wing candidate will get support in Sligo in the same way as Joe Higgins does in West Dublin. Problem is that Bree is not such a person. He voted twice for right-wing Taoisigh.

Is it true that the two last meetings of labour in Sligo were called off .The meeting for last thur was called off because the two cllrs were away in norway and denmark on tax payer money. The party in sligo is now dead in the water. With mc garry they make there bed they can now lie in it

I was not talking about bree' I was talking about the last two monthly meeting been called off in sligo / leitrim after polling just 1500 votes in the G E where the candidate hide the day of the count, I saying new labour in sligo is dead in the water. I like sharing good news

"I was not talking about bree' I was talking about the last two monthly meeting been called off in sligo / leitrim after polling just 1500 votes in the G E where the candidate hide the day of the count, I saying new labour in sligo is dead in the water. I like sharing good news"

I see, you're a right winger here to gloat. Fair enough. The only problem is this thread is about Bree and his vitriol towards Labour. Funny how your objectives seem to coincide. But sure why wouldn't they, Bree is up to his neck in electoral pacts with FF, where it seems he will find a home in his twilight years.

Regardless of your politics you've got to admit that Declan Bree has always been a strong and unique personality in the dull middle Ireland culture of Sligo and Leitrim. From Connolly Youth Movement (after Legion of Mary) to independent left to Labour and now back to independent left since the early 1970s is some career. He's had his hand in all the causes over the years - local housing protests, H-Block, the prolife issue, Reagan's visit to Ballyporeen, the Shannon-Iraq issue - you name it, he's been there. He cultivated a local power base carefully which Sinn Fein after the 1981 hunger strikes gradually mobilised to dismantle. Mayor of Sligo and one-term Labour TD are testament to his dogged determination and instinctive campaigning. Only one honour eludes him, Sligo Person of the Year, which the mediocre social establishment will never grant him. But the stress on personality politics west of the Shannon kills ideology and political movements fade away with their activist champions. Maybe it's true about most of Ireland. The public puts personal dynamism before ideas.

well said lenin no one can touch bree. To be elected at 22 in 1974 as a member of connelly youth in the west of ireland was amazing. To have a member of new labour losing the head over him in 2007 proofs how good he is.

I think that 'Lenin Sarsfiled' is having a laugh. Many a sell-out has a glorious past.

Ever since the downfall of the Stalinist Soviet Union Bree has been like a rudderless boat. Bree went into Dáil and twice voted for right-wing Taoisigh. Bree went into the Dáil and voted for tax amnesties. That was the time for Bree to stand up and be a voice of left-opposition to the sell-out Labour leadership. Bree lost his seat as he sold out and the Labour Party sold out. If he stood up then and left that Party he'd have been re-elected in 1997 and most likely since then.

Even in the last weeks even after posing on the left around the McGarry issue he has sold out. He voted for a Fianna Fáil Mayor in return for a chain around his neck. I'm sure after the Revolution the school children will learn of how Comrade Bree mastered great advances for the world working class in return for his vote while he had the Deputy Mayoralty of a town in Western Ireland.

Bree knew his sell outs in the Dail caused him his seat and since 1997 has been trying to re-establish himself as a hard-line soclialist. Attacking the leadership when it suited him, jumping on every left-wing profile enhancing media event that passed his way.

All this proves is that his politics are not hewn from core socialist principles but rather are steered by the perception of giving what he thinks the public want or will get him elected.